Rusty Angel chasing Royal Gramma

[lego]

I bought a Royal Gramma about 2 months ago and finally finished quarantining him (came in with slight case of ick). I recently introduced him to my main display 55g.

The royal gramma wants to swim out in the open, but every time my Rusty Angel sees him, he charges at him like a bull. Is this normal brhavior for a Rusty Angel? Do you think its the colors of the gramma that is driving him nuts. Seriously when he spots him out of the corner of his eye he immediately charges. Do I need to pull the gramma? The angel is usually very mild mannered, leaves my clowns alone.

After the first day I thought the gramma was a goner, but on a nuch I flashed a light into my Remora's pre-filter and found him swimming in there (he either hopped it or went through the teeth... I was very relieved, after 2 months of QTing him, I don't want to lose him.

I have a 7 gallon Minibow nano at work (with a AQ 500 refugium) with a firefish and a yellow watchman goby, I wasn't planning on any more fish for that tank, but the gramma might do a heck of a lot better in there if my Angel won't stop.

[sfsuphysics]

Don't know about the specific breed but occasionally some fish will try to assert themselves in the pecking order of the tank. When I got a coral beauty my Kole tang did the same thing chased him like crazy for a couple days every time he saw him, after a couple days though nothing.

[swingdaddy]

I've got a coral beauty and royal gamma in my 50 and they do fine.
The way i introduced the royal was to float him in one of them clear breeding boxes used for freshwater fishes. the royal was in it for a couple of days. i would feed food by the box, so the coral and royal could see each other during feeding. I guess the coral beauty got used to seeing him in a couple of days, so i took a chance and released the royal.

[lego]

Royal was dried up on top of tank when I got home :( Rusty Angel must have chased him through the only opening in the top of the tank. I've never seen a fish charge like that before, I've seen them chase a little, but never charge like a bull seeing red.

[swingdaddy]

sorry to hear about that. i didn't know rusty's were that mean.
maybe next time you can trap the rusty and introduce a royal first and reintroduce the rusty.

[lego]

It was weird, my rusty is peaceful to the other fish in the tank (bangaii cardinal, 2 ocellarus clowns, 2 green chromis, lawnmower blenny) - he even seems to try to break up fights between the clowns! . Whenever he spotted the royal gramma his fins stood straight up and he charged as fast as he could.

I have to believe it had something to do with the color of the royal gramma. Such a beautiful fish - what a bummer. I got it for $4 as part of the etropicals group buy a while back!

I have to wonder if reintrocuding the rusty would have any effect. The royal was much smaller, it honestly didn't seem like a territorial thing as much as an instinctual hate.